Board of Regents Approves Policy to Assist Home Schoolers

The Board of Regents today approved the immediate implementation of a policy that will facilitate access to the University System of Georgia’s colleges and universities by home-schooled students and others who attend non-accredited high schools in the state.

Home-schooled students–who generally are unable to provide a standardized transcript which reflects fulfillment of the University System’s requirement of a College Preparatory Curriculum–now will be able to fulfill the CPC requirement by taking the SAT II Subject-Area Tests developed by the Educational Testing Service of Princeton, New Jersey.

The new policy replaces one that made access to USG institutions difficult at best because of the inability of some students to present acceptable evidence of CPC completion. It will now allow students who are not graduates of accredited high schools to submit SAT II tests to document CPC proficiency. These tests parallel the five CPC subject areas which potential students must master, namely, math, English, science, social science, and foreign language. The initial SAT II tests that will be required include: English Writing, Math Ic, American History & Social Studies, and one test from the Biology, Chemistry or Physics tests.

University System of Georgia Chancellor Stephen R. Portch has left room for home-school proponents who do not support the SAT II Subject-Area Tests to propose an alternative methodology which achieves the same goals of providing fairness to all students and measures the breadth of curriculum a potential student has studied. If an acceptable alternative is identified, a pilot program would be developed to track the performance of students admitted under each approach. The results of the pilot would be used to modify the new policy if necessary.

“Our goal is to serve the students of Georgia,” said Portch. “Regardless of how or where they received their previous education, our sole interest is in insuring that all students come to the University System prepared to succeed.”